Chapter LXV
{Last nine freaking chapters, hoomans.}
YEAR 2008
It's been a long dream, and a long memory— it's still unfinished though, and a lot of your questions are still unanswered. You want to think about it more but you can't. When your eyes gazes at the calendar near your bed, you see the current date.
It is the date of the final battle.
With a small sigh after waking up and finding out your past memories with Manjiro filled with agony and misery, you are wondering how you ended up here in this timeline trying to save the man who breaks you. The funny thing in addition is the fact that even in this timeline, you love him and you're freely giving him the opportunity to break you again. Some things never really change, huh.
"Damn it, Manjiro." You whispered to yourself, "If you are in this timeline, if the you that I know is here with me in this fucking timeline, then are you still playing your games?"
Of course you received no response, You massaged your forehead and sigh. The Manjiro in this timeline knows nothing about what his future self will do, and you love him genuinely. You love his every persona in whatever timeline genuinely. Damn, it's hard being a simp.
You push all those thoughts away temporarily as you did your usual morning routine. When you go outside, you see the gang sitting in your living room while drinking coffee and eating the doughnuts from your fridge, which you bought last night but forgot to eat since you're too tired.
"Good morning, (Y/N)." Baji started with a smile while munching the doughnut, "How's your sleep?"
"How many pieces have you eaten?" You asked in pain, ignoring his question.
"Oh. No worries. We just got into the fourth box, there's still two pieces of doughnuts left haha."
Wow, they eat almost everything. You blink in betrayal as you look at the men inside your living room. Baji, Hiro-san, Izana, Mitsuya, and Chifuyu. All of them are munching the doughnuts. You just massage your head even more and give them a supportive look, as you turn towards your kitchen to make your own coffee. You don't mind them eating like that though. They deserve the doughnuts so they can have it.
Those kids will have it rough later.
—
Before the battle starts, you need to talk to a certain someone. Your eyes gazed at the entirety of the prison place where he is being imprisoned. You walked inside and signed a visitor's visit before walking towards the waiting area where you can see him. From a glass barrier, you see a man in a prison uniform being held until he's finally sitting across you. His eyes are confused and lifeless, like he's given up with everything he has held.
You give him a gentle look, "How are you, Kazutora?"
A glint of confusion flashes across his eyes but he remains impassive, "Who are you?"
With a calm smile, you lean on your seat as you stare directly into his eyes. You also pull a certain paper inside your pocket, "Who am I doesn't matter at all. I have important things to tell you."
"I don't even know you."
"I know," You answered, "But I know you, and you have an important role in all of these because you're special."
With the sudden remark, Kazutora's eyes turn a little shocked and more confused. He opens his mouth but he seems to think of something so he closes it again. After multiple breaths, "What do you want?"
You slip the small envelope in the small hole at the bottom of the glass barrier. Kazutora looked down on it before getting it. He didn't read it. He just holds it inside his palm before looking at you again.
"When you have the time, please read everything inside that envelope. I'm sorry I have to take a few minutes of your life, but your cooperation in this matter is significant." You stated.
Kazutora look around and sighed, "If this has something to do with me being a delinquent, then I don't—"
"No," You cut him before he misunderstood the situation, "It's about you being a friend."
His eyebrows raised in a questioning look but he didn't say anything anymore. You give him a small smile before you stand up and turn around. Kazutora waits for you to walk away but before you start walking, you tilt your head to look at him for the last time.
"Baji misses you."
Kazutora's eyes widened and you walked away like nothing happened. You'll leave it to him.
—
The entire day was spent like a surreal dream. You didn't do anything except spend it with your family, the ones who are staying in your house and eating everything inside your fridge. You cook lunch with Emma, and do some cardiovascular exercises with them later on. You spend your noon and afternoon talking to them sincerely, sipping tea, and laughing with them as well. You get to talk about small things and it's precious.
An hour before getting into the battle, you saw Izana leaning on the fridge in the kitchen with his arms crossed while looking at you. You can't read his expression but you look at him with a questioning gaze nonetheless.
"You're planning to do things that you haven't consulted with us first, aren't you?" He asked as he stared at you observingly.
You blink calmly, "Of course not."
"You're lying," Izana replied but you remained looking at him with a blank expression, "You can tell it to me, (Y/N). Trust me."
Instead of trying to revert the topic, you just look away and sigh a little, "I trust you, Izana. You know that. Trust me too, I'm doing these for all of you."
Izana closed his eyes and you can see his tense shoulders as he exhaled in exasperation, "We're a team but you're always working alone."
"What do you mean?"
"You have a lot of things you're keeping from us. Yes, you are giving us the information that we need to do, and you're working with us. You even let us stay in your house, but every time, I feel as if there's a million things that I don't know about you. Do you really trust me, (Y/N)? Then why can't you tell it to me?"
You look at his direction with impassive eyes. Suddenly, a vision flashes over you again. It is the same vision that you keep seeing whenever you look at Izana for the past three years. Your heart aches as a lump starts building in your throat.
"Izana!" You shouted as you ran as fast towards where he was laying down. His entire body is beaten and he's got a huge cut from his shoulder down to his stomach. A lot of blood is gushing out of his body. You cried as you held him in your arms, pleading hard until you saw him smile at you with gentleness before closing his eyes permanently.
"Do you really not trust me, (Y/N)?" He asked again and you blink calmly as you grit your teeth silently. You can't tell him about those visions. You'll protect him with all your must. But your chest is aching so damn hard whenever those visions visit you.
For the entire years of being transported here, you've been seeing visions of all their possible deaths. You've seen them die repeatedly, in different ways, for uncountable times, every day. Every single day. It's torturous and fucking painful, it's traumatising. You've been dealing with all those visions repeatedly until it slowly causes extreme misery inside your mind. It makes you desperate to save them and do everything to stop it from happening. In every second you act tough in front of them, you are miserable inside because you keep on seeing the worst possible future of those people you love daily. You have been bearing that misery ever since but for everyone, you have to stay strong and sane.
Instead of explaining them all to Izana, or to anyone else, you just give him a pretentious smile, "I trust you, Izana. Please trust me, too."
He didn't seem satisfied with your answer but he exhaled and took a step towards you before messing your hair gently. You blink at his odd gesture, and without any hesitation, Izana leaned closer towards you... making your eyes widened with the sudden closeness.
"You know what..." He started as he held off your shoulders, making you freeze on your spot. He's being too close.
"Izana... back off." You muttered but he just stares in your eyes deeply, not bulging or even letting you go.
"...I used to hate Mikey in the past because he took Shinichiro-san away from me." He whispered and slowly held your chin to make you look up to him. You're too confused and dumbfounded with what he's doing right now.
"What are you doing, Izana?" You asked in a calmly dangerous tone because right now, what he's showing you is odd. His face is an inch away from you that both of your nose almost touches and you want him to explain why in the first place is he doing all of these.
"...Now, I'm slowly hating him for taking you away from me." He added before he planted a small kiss on your forehead. It is a gentle, light kiss but it is filled with emotions. Your eyes widened slightly, "...Do you know how disappointed I am, (Y/N)? For the second time in my life, Mikey stole someone important from me."
"Izana..."
"...If I was the person I am in the past, I would have gotten extremely pissed off." He smiled softly and held your cheeks before he took a step backwards, finally giving you the space to breathe, "...But right now, I learned to love Mikey as my brother, and I respect you, too, (Y/N)."
Izana pats your head gently before he turns around and walks out of the kitchen, leaving you alone. You're shocked for a minute as you try to process what he just stated, and when you realize what exactly is he trying to imply, you feel your heart tightened a little inside your chest. It is because of one thing.
You can't give what you don't have to Izana. You love him but as a family connected to your heart. Manjiro had taken a toll of space inside your heart that you know it will be impossible in whatever timeline to try and give what he owns inside you to someone else.
In silence, you start preparing yourself for the fight— pushing what happened a minute ago away for now.
After a few hours, you make your knuckles sound as your eyes turn impassive and dangerous. You are now wearing your white and golden White Phoenixes uniform as you look at the man sitting the motorcycle beside you. There are six of you wearing the white trench coat; Hiro-san, Izana, Baji, Chifuyu, and Mitsuya. The others are wearing their black crows uniform. The other members of the past Tokyo Manji Gang are also there. Smiley, Angry, Hakkai, and others. There are hundreds of subordinates under your wings and you forcefully maneuver your engine to create a loud sound that would alert everyone.
"White Phoenixes, Black Crows, arise!" You shouted and maneuvered your engine again. You are in the front line as you calmly exhale and put on your white and golden volto mask.
Without any hesitation, the entire White Phoenixes gang drove towards the huge area where everything will come to a conclusion. Your eyes are sharp as you drive so fast and keen. The gears are trembling from within your grasp as you speed up like a badass. You can hear the loud roars of all the motorcycles speeding up with you and you can't help but to smile a little.
It's been six years since you got transported into this timeline.
It's been a long time.
And now, everything will come to an end tonight.
You are determined and focused as you push all the thoughts away from your mind before going to the place where all of these will end.
Let's begin the conclusion of all of these, Manjiro.
—
The entire arena is filled with people from different gangs. Each one has their own space and are holding their own flag. Brahman has 1,700 members. Leepon Fang has 1,500 members (their numbers surprisingly increased), and Bonten Organization has 2,000 members. There are only 7 members of White Phoenixes but 1,000 members of Black Crows under your wings.
Those numbers of people filled the arena with an unnerving amount of violent atmosphere. From afar, you hear Tiger (the vice president of Leepon Fang) shouting, "Come at us, fuckers!"
Leon is surprisingly silent as he seems to observe the surroundings which is a good sign since he was beaten up badly last time. Senju is also in her own place with Takemitchi and Draken beside her. Takeomi, Benkei, Wakasa, and other Brahman members are also there. Then, your head tilts to the last gang in the area, and you immediately recognize Manjiro while he's wearing his white coat. His eyes are cold and dangerous. Sanzu, the Haitani brothers, Kakucho, and others stand beside him, too. You lean silently as you put your hands in your pocket. You give a silent glance to the entire place. It is really spacious and everyone is agitated to fight as soon as possible.
No one among the gangs started their move yet.
They are silently observing their opponents, silently calculating the possible time to attack. Everyone is silent but that silence was cut short when Sanzu, the pink-haired man from the Bonten Organization, shouted something.
"Hey! You idiots! Let's get this battle going, can we!? Plus, you're a team made out of losers, you guys are obviously no match for us!" Sanzu smirk and point at his temple, "If you want to make memories, go somewhere else!"
Some of their members laugh to support his bickers. You blink innocently as you feel the second hand embarrassment for him. You also want to beat Sanzu later since he literally owes you a lot of beatings because of what he did to your future self. You remained silent as you listened to his continuous arguments.
"Today we will defeat you, Bonten! Come and kill us if you can! No matter what happens, we will never give in! We will defeat you, no matter what!" Takemitchi screams in response.
"We're not into fighting kids here, motherfucker!" Sanzu shouts back with his hands on his hips, "Go surrender or we'll beat your asses up!"
They start screaming against each other and you and the others are there standing in awkward silence, waiting for them to finally stop fighting verbally. After a few minutes, you hear Takemitchi shouts again, "Come on, Manjiro!"
Manjiro's eyes are dark and cold as he stated, "Go on."
That seems like a bell as everyone runs towards the center to start the chaotic bloody fight.
You remained standing with your hands on your pocket as the Black crows started fighting the others as well. You see the other White Phoenixes members getting into their designated positions, ready to fight whoever they're destined to fight. As for you, you stayed standing on your ground because you know someone will come to you right now. There are people running over your direction and trying to aim a punch, but you're quick and all of them ended up laying on the ground unconscious.
Your eyes observe your surroundings and everyone is fighting to their heart's content. From afar, you see Baji fighting with Hanma (who is currently in Bonten), Izana fighting Kakucho, Shinichiro fighting Wakasa and Benkei, Mitsuya and Hakkai fighting the twins, and Chifuyu running towards Takemitchi to help the man as well. You sighed calmly and when you turned around, you saw Sanzu standing a few meters away from you. He's holding a metal pipe with a huge grin on his face.
"You damned phoenixes are total pain in the ass," He muttered as take a closer step towards you, enough for the metal pipe to reach your head if he'll hit you, "Are you the fucking leader?"
You didn't reply as you smiled underneath your mask. You are waiting for him, and after different timeline of getting beaten and tortured by Sanzu without getting to fight him at all, a rush of satisfaction flows in your veins as you face him and lean straight on your back.
"From the look of it, you seemed like the leader." He added and without a second word, he strikes the metal pipe towards your head in which you immediately dodge. You throw a quick and strong kick towards his elbow for him to let go of the pipe.
Sanzu's eyes widened in excitement as the metal pipe fell to the ground from his hands. He's now barehand and your hands are still in your pocket. Sanzu might not see your face but he knows that you are looking straight at him.
"You never knew how to play fair, did you?" You asked in an impassive and dominating tone as you sighed.
He chuckles in annoyance before running towards you and throwing a punch in your direction. You dodge it again and block the punch with your arms before you kick his stomach in which he immediately blocks as well. Without giving him a proper moment to breath, you spin and let a roundhouse kick hit his temple. He blocks it again but he was taken aback by the force. He curses under his breath as he throws a straight kick on your gut, which you avoided, before throwing an uppercut. You dodge his uppercut, and use his opening to kick him straight to his ribs. Sanzu groans in pain before throwing a careless punch again, but you dodge all of them as your violent hook hits his cheeks, making him groan again.
"You... really are a pain in ass!" He hissed before running towards you and you remembered that time when he electrocuted you in your future timeline.
All the anger stored in your body for him is given to him when your fist landed on directly to his face. Your punch is too strong that you feel his nose get a little broken. Sanzu's eyes widened a little as he was taken aback again.
"Did you know how many times you tortured me in the future?" You whispered, clenching your fist hard, "Ah, I hate you." You spin and roundhouse kick his neck, before punching his gut hard, making Sanzu spit a little blood.
You're just getting started. Your eyes look at him blankly as you continue the fight with this pink-haired man.
Takemitchi is fighting people with the White Phoenix member beside him. He doesn't have to guess who it was when the masked man stated, "Aibo (partner)," earlier. He's a hundred percent sure that it is Chifuyu. His eyes are searching for someone, for Mikey. He needs to talk to the man.
From afar, he sees Mikey sitting at the top of a shipping container, just watching the entire chaotic battle with bored eyes. Takemitchi clenches his fist as he looks at Chifuyu, "Let's get to him, Chifuyu!"
"Alright!"
But before they can move forward, a lot of members from Leepon Fang surround them. Takemitchi and Chifuyu start fighting them.
A meter away from them, Shinichiro is accepting punches from his friends, Benkei and Wakasa. With him, Inupi is fighting, the man is wearing a black crow uniform. Inupi isn't aware that he's fighting with the man he looks up to, but he feels secure and light alongside the mysterious masked man.
Izana is not really fighting Kakucho. He barely throws a punch, all he does is dodge and block Kaku's punches and kicks. He remembers how he fought with Kakucho from months ago, and like this time, he's not really fighting him. He can't bring himself to punch his friend. Funny how he sees Kakucho as his friend now.
"Why aren't you fighting back?" Kakucho asked in annoyance, before he stopped throwing punches at the masked man. He knows the man wouldn't even throw a punch at him so it'll be a waste of energy to continuously punch him.
Izana punches the people going near his direction effortlessly as he answers, "No comment."
Kakucho cocked his eyebrows since there's something about the man that makes him dumbfounded. He doesn't know what it is but his dodges are somehow familiar. His voice... it's barely recognizable due to the mask but Kakucho can feel something... odd.
"Why are you wearing a mask when you can just fight without it?" He asked and punched the gut of a brahman member getting closer towards him.
Izana kicked two people simultaneously, letting the men fall on the ground as he replied, "No comment."
Kakucho just mutters tsk before he turns around from the masked man and oddly fights other gangs alongside him like they're old comrades.
"Geez, I hate zombies like you." Draken mumbled standing next to a White Phoenix masked man (Baji), as they are fighting with Hanma who adores how the two of them fight.
Draken knows Baji is alive and he's glad he's able to fight with his friend right now. Draken didn't join the White Phoenixes at all due to his commitment with Brahman but he promises to support everyone in White Phoenixes. Baji is smirking underneath his mask as his dynamic with Draken is enough to catch Hanma off guard. They continuously fight.
Mitsuya and Hakkai Shiba are fighting the Haitani Twins, too, and they are doing well.
You open your eyes again as those visions just flood inside your brain without you noticing, like a perpetrator who just enters without your consent. You smile calmly knowing that they're safe wherever they are. You don't have to search for them because you know how they are doing.
You are standing calmly on your feet as your eyes drop to Sanzu who is now breathing hard and kneeling in front of you after you beat him hard.
"Our leader won't be able to attend due to personal reasons."
"Oh? Too bad. Then I have no reason to stay here."
"Do you have any words that are needed to deliver to the White Phoenixes?"
"None except for we'll destroy you."
"Ok."
"Ok? Whatever. Tell your leader or the entire clan of birds to prepare for that war. I also want to give your leader some beatings but seeing you here as an alternative who looks weak, I change my mind."
"Weak? I look weak?"
"Yeah."
You kneel in front of Sanzu to level him before you pull his hair harshly, making him stare into your eyes with anger. You coldly look back into his eyes, "Do I look weak now to you, Sanzu?" You whispered in a dangerous tone and Sanzu's eyes looked shocked.
"Y...you're that woman!?"
Your eyes drop on his hands which are aiming to get something underneath his coat, it is probably his sword, and without any hesitation, you use your free hand to stop his hands from getting that sword.
"I told you to play fair, didn't I?" You mumbled as your grip on his hair tightened. You see his adam's apple moving and his jaw clenching while he groans almost inaudibly in pain.
"Who exactly are you?" He whispered and you gently pulled the sword from his coat and aimed it at his throat, while still grasping his hair mercilessly.
"Never underestimate the weak." You mutter as the cold metal blade touches his skin but you're not digging it all. Sanzu is frozen while staring at you with an unexplainable expression.
"Damn...it." He whispered and you sighed. You are about to stand up and throw the sword away but then you hear a woman's voice from a few meters behind you.
"Sanzu-nii!" It's the voice of Senju, and she looks like she's also beaten a lot of asses up. She was about to run towards you but before she could reach your direction, you spoke.
"Senju," She freezes when she recognizes your voice, "I'll leave him to you."
You stand up and let go of Sanzu's hair while holding his sword. You need to dispose of this thing before anyone uses it for worse. You turn around and leave the currently kneeling, beaten, and dumbfounded Sanzu with his sister. You know they'll fight but they have their own matters to settle for now.
From afar, you see Manjiro sitting at the top while watching the fight. You stopped on your pace when his gaze landed in your direction. A cold breeze of air touches you and you feel chills. Everything around seems to stop as he holds your gaze captive hopelessly. His eyes are cold and dark while staring at you as if you've done something wrong.
You don't know what's with his dangerous stares but you didn't do anything except getting too close to Sanzu a few minutes ago... oh.
Is Manjiro getting jealous right now? At this damn battle?
Bruh, he shouldn't. You never simp so damn hard for anyone else except him so your conscience is clean. You're the first one to avert your gaze and ignore him temporarily before walking towards where you should be walking next. If you'll get yourself too distracted by that perfect man sitting at the top over there, you won't be able to do your mission. You ran away from him and went to the next stop.
You'll deal with Manjiro later, for now... you must do what you must do.
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